


Grey on Grey

by queenklu



Category: Captain America (Movies), Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-03
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:47:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25057939
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queenklu/pseuds/queenklu
Summary: prompt: Steve couldn't afford any of the portfolios from the bookshop Peggy took him to in Soho but he went back more than once to browse and speak with the owner. Imagine his surprise when he sees the store and Mr Fell are still there 70 years later.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens), James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 8
Kudos: 270





	Grey on Grey

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to trcunning for the prompt!!

“Steve?” 

Steve brought himself back to the present with a shake, though the bookshop remained pristine as ghosts of soldiers scattered back into his memories. It looked exactly the same, red-brown brick and off-white pillars, gold lettering above the door. 

“Go on ahead,” he said, “I’ll catch up.” 

Natasha looked amused but unimpressed. “You know they have these things called ebooks, now--” she started, but Sam rolled his eyes at her and ushered them along. 

“Let the old man have his books…” 

Their voices faded away with the ringing of the shop bell as Steve ducked inside. 

The shop was so exactly the same he half expected to see Peggy look up and smile at him over a stack of good mystery novels. He swore it was the same books on the display, some a little dusty with covers faded, but well-cared-for. Well loved. 

It was something that had always struck him about this place, how loved it felt. How soft and warm and safe. Even when his army pay couldn’t be stretched to afford anything here--not that he’d have wanted to take any of these nice books into the trenches--he’d always felt welcome by the owner. 

“Go away, we haven’t got anything by whoever you’re looking for!” a voice called from the back, and Steve looked up to see that very owner pop into view. 

Mr. Fell perpetually looked on the cusp of slipping out of middle aged and into older gentleman, with his white-puffed hair and his friendly smile-lines. It was this, and the surprise of seeing an old friend mixed with the cobwebs of old memory, that caused Steve’s scientifically enhanced synapses to delay just long enough for him to extend his hand in greeting. 

“Mr. Fell!” 

“Goodness!” Mr. Fell cried with similar delight, grasping his hand in a good shake. “Crowley, come see! It’s young Mr. Rogers!” 

Perhaps it was the ‘young’ that tipped the scales for both of them, as one realized young Mr. Rogers should not be quite so young, and the other realized that old Mr. Fell should be...quite a  _ bit  _ older. 

They froze, in time for Mr. Fell’s lanky companion to slither in from the back, and pause. “...Huh,” he said (Steve had never caught his name before, since the man had always skulked in the shadows on Steve’s previous visits, though now he could guess his name was ‘Crowley’), “shouldn’t you be nearly dead by now?” 

“Crowley,” Mr. Fell scolded, “that’s not a very nice thing to say.” 

“Dunno, how long do humans live?” 

“ _ Crowley! _ ” Aziraphale finally realized the only way to end the handshake was to drop Steve’s hand to wring his own. “Oh bother. Should we use a miracle to erase his memory?” 

Steve took a hard step back, in time to the sharp jangle of the shop bell as Bucky strode in. 

“I wouldn’t recommend it,” Bucky said, low and toneless. 

Steve swallowed back a sigh, trying to pretend he wasn’t just a little bit relieved. “I thought you’d gone with the others.” 

Bucky didn’t take his eyes off their adversaries, if they could be called that, but Steve still got the feeling he was internally rolling his eyes. “Only you could find trouble in a bookshop.” 

“Boy, do I know that feeling,” drawled Crowley. 

“Did you say ‘miracle?’” Steve asked. 

“Don’t fret, angel,” Crowley cut in when Mr. Fell worried his knuckles even more. “And you,” he added to Bucky, “I can see you clocking the heaviest objects in the room, and I’d advise you not to do anything stupid. He only just got the place organized again.” 

“Dreadful gendered children’s novels in the  _ back _ ,” Mr. Fell muttered. “But Crowley, what are we going to  _ do? _ I don’t know what age young Mr. Rogers expects us to be but we’re certainly not it.” 

“He seems rather timeless himself,” Crowley pointed out, slouching a step closer with his hands in his pockets. His eyes were very bright behind his sunglasses, though Steve couldn’t guess at a color. The machinery of Bucky’s arm gave a low, warning  _ whirr. _

“I think I do remember you,” Crowley continued, unbothered. “The War, wasn’t it? They had you stuffed in some awful freezer.” 

The sunglasses, Steve realized too late, also made it impossible to tell which one of them he was looking at. 

“Were you working with Zola?” Steve demanded, a low, sick feeling growing in his stomach. 

“ _ That _ puddle of human pestilence? No. I tried to set your lot up for success catching him and his lot loads of times. Never went anywhere. That whole Hydra exposé a while back certainly explained why.” 

He wrinkled his nose. Somehow, he’d managed to place himself directly between them and his companion, the same way Bucky was angling to get himself in front of Steve. 

“No, I was there to track down a source of loose ethereal energy.” He tipped an eyebrow up a fraction. “ _ You _ .” 

“Oh!” Mr. Fell suddenly said. “There was another one, wasn’t there, around the same time? Off in America? I was sent to investigate, but by the time I got there everything was a bit more...blown up...than it had been before. I thought whatever it was had been destroyed.” 

His wide blue eyes fixed on Steve. “Oh,” he said, voice soft, “Oh yes, I can see them now.” 

“Them?” Steve repeated, skin crawling in an almost not-unpleasant way.

“Your wings,” Mr. Fell said, and looked at Bucky too, “Both of them.” 

“I smelled it on you right away,” Crowley piped up. “Honestly, until now I thought you were a spy for his side.” 

“No sides,” Mr. Fell chided gently, at last looking away so he could take Crowley’s hand, and tug him back close. “Not anymore.” 

Even as hardened a front as he put on, Crowley seemed to melt a little. “Of course, angel.” 

“What does this mean,” Steve got out, wishing more than anything that he could do the same to Bucky. Bucky looked at him, sharply, not like he’d heard the thought but like he wanted just as desperately to know, but hadn’t found the words. 

Crowley shrugged. “Dunno. Maybe nothing. Looks like immortality, but maybe not.” 

“I think,” Mr. Fell said, “it’s whatever the two of you decide it to mean. Together.” 

That was a very profound thing to think, or say, on a Thursday afternoon in a bookshop in London--but though Steve wasn’t to know it, recently this same bookshop had had a great number of profound things happen in it. And twice on Sundays. 

So what was one more? In the grand scheme of things, one man taking another man’s hand wasn’t monumental--not even if one of the hands in question happened to be cybernetic. No one would write a book about it, or slip it into the shelves of this magnificent shop suspended in time. But it did Happen, and it Happened with a capital H that had been waiting in the wings of this particular story for quite a long time. 

Soon enough, two hearts would rejoin the bustle of the world outside. Only this time, they’d be walking close enough together that the feathers on the wings they’d never known they had were intermingled, grey on grey. 

**Author's Note:**

> The world is broken and awful but this can be found [here on tumblr if you'd like to share it! ](https://queenklu.tumblr.com/post/622567888654581760/prompt-steve-couldnt-afford-any-of-the)


End file.
